In full disclosure, I just had to look up exactly what constituted “Siberia.” I knew it was in Russia, but wasn’t exactly sure where. Once I consulted my trusty Google device, I found a map – but only after getting lost image searching “Siberian Husky” (damn you, autocorrect). Following the doggie diversion, I learned that Siberia is over 5 million square miles vast and consists of tundra, forests, and snowy peaks. It covers 77 percent of Russia’s land mass, yet is home to only 27 percent of the population. That’s probably because temperatures can delve well below freezing, making it not ideal for sustaining life…let alone surfing.
But it leave it up to Russia – where children grow up casually sipping vodka – to do something crazy. Turns out there’s a select group of Russian surfers that brave the Siberian surf, bundled up in god only knows how many millimeters thick of neoprene. Their spot of choice is the Kuril Islands, nestled in the south near the Russian China border. While it’s much warmer than the Arctic Ocean north, it’s still by no means warm, as the crew experiences with a frigid typhoon.
For those non-Russian speakers, the first guy interviewed speaks like Denis Leary on meth, making the subtitles fast and a little tough to follow. But nonetheless, all the guys are fairly insightful and glad they went on this untraditional surf trip. The best surfing of the clip comes towards the end where it appears that the waves finally turn on – it looks a little like the left at Lowers during a really high tide. And it’s not like the surfers are Kelly Slater or anything, but can ya blame ’em? If you were surfing in Siberia would you…wait, you probably wouldn’t even surf. You’d probably just drink vodka instead. Yeah, me too.
